Peter Morse

Phase Transitions of Adsorbed Atoms on the Surface of a Carbon Nanotube

Phase Transitions on Carbon Nanotubes The nature of phase transitions changes with system dimensionality. Many aspects of two-dimensional systems have been explored by adsorbing rare gases on graphite surfaces. Wang et al. (p. 552) reduce the dimensionality further by examining phase transitions of argon and krypton on single-walled carbon nanotubes, following the extent of surface coverage and mapping out phase transitions by using the nanotube as a resonator. Changing the conductance and thus the density of surface electrons also allowed exploration of the effect of adsorbate-surface interactions. The adsorption behavior of rare gases is followed through changes in resonance frequency of a single-walled carbon nanotube. Phase transitions of adsorbed atoms and molecules on two-dimensional substrates are well explored, but similar transitions in the one-dimensional limit have been more difficult to study experimentally. Suspended carbon nanotubes can act as nanoscale resonators with remarkable electromechanical properties and the ability to detect adsorption at the level of single atoms. We used single-walled carbon nanotube resonators to study the phase behavior of adsorbed argon and krypton atoms as well as their coupling to the substrate electrons. By monitoring the resonance frequency in the presence of gases, we observed the formation of monolayers on the cylindrical surface, phase transitions within them, and simultaneous modification of the electrical conductance.

Echoes of the Glass Transition in Athermal Soft Spheres

Recent theoretical advances have led to the creation of a unified phase diagram for the thermal glass and athermal jamming transitions. This diagram makes clear that, while related, the mode-coupling-or dynamic-glass transition is distinct from the jamming transition, occurring at a finite temperature and significantly lower density than the jamming transition. Nonetheless, we demonstrate a prejamming transition in athermal frictionless spheres which occurs at the same density as the mode-coupling transition and is marked by percolating clusters of locally rigid particles. At this density in both the thermal and athermal systems, individual motions of an extensive number of particles become constrained, such that only collective motion is possible. This transition, which is well below jamming, exactly matches the definition of collective behavior at the dynamical transition of glasses. Thus, we reveal that the genesis of rigidity in both thermal and athermal systems is governed by the same underlying topological transition in their shared configuration space.

Hidden symmetries in jammed systems

There are deep, but hidden, geometric structures within jammed systems, associated with hidden symmetries. These can be revealed by repeated transformations under which these structures lead to fixed points. These geometric structures can be found in the Voronoi tesselation of space defined by the packing. In this paper we examine two iterative processes: maximum inscribed sphere (MIS) inversion and a real-space coarsening scheme. Under repeated iterations of the MIS inversion process we find invariant systems in which every particle is equal to the maximum inscribed sphere within its Voronoi cell. Using a real-space coarsening scheme we reveal behavior in geometric order parameters which is length-scale invariant.